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Regrowing bone naturally

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

Bioengineers and surgeons have been making waves in bone tissue engineering, allowing them to heal and regrow broken bones without the need for bone grafts or metal plates.

Early last year, 18-year-old Nikita (not her real name) was seriously injured in a car accident in India that killed both her parents.

The Indian teenager's skull was shattered in the crash and she had a large, palm-size hole in her skull. A desperate uncle took her to neurosurgeon Sharan Srinivasan in Bangalore.

Dr Srinivasan took one look at the injury and called materials engineer Prof Teoh Swee Hin in Singapore, an expert in coaxing bone to grow back on biodegradable bone plugs and scaffolds.

Prof Teoh, now at Nanyang Technological University, and his team put together a spider-web like titanium frame, which held in place sheets of flexible, biodegradable scaffolds infused with Nikita's own bone marrow.

Besides producing red blood cells and some white blood cells, bone marrow also contains the cells that are, or will turn into, the main component of bone.

Now, a year and a half on, the hole in Nikita's skull has healed. "I went to Bangalore in August, a year after the surgery, and I could not recognise her," Prof Teoh said.

Around the world, there have been about 10 such cases in the past three years, Prof Teoh said.

Bone tissue engineering is used to help patients who have lost bone to cancer – in accidents, or in some types of brain surgery which involve drilling holes in the skull - to regrow and remodel damaged bone. The technology, which started a decade ago with producing tiny bone plugs the size of a five-cent coin, has now advanced to a stage where it could provide a safer, less painful treatment for people who have larger areas of bone damage.

Experts from Singapore and around the world were in town for the sixth Bone Tissue Engineering Congress, or Bone-Tec, at Nanyang Technological University earlier this month.

At the congress, Prof Teoh presented a surprising new finding: Bone grew back most where the curved titanium frame was exerting force on the surrounding area.

It is not clear exactly why bone growth follows these lines of force, although doctors have long known that bone needs stresses such as weight-bearing exercise for bone health, Prof Teoh said.

"In Nikita's case, we won't know till five years later whether the bone is hard enough; we hope that it will continue to remodel and in due time it'll be almost perfect."

Regrown bone has other benefits, he added. When large titanium plates or pieces are used, the patient's body may reject them, and there is a risk of infection about three to four years later.

Dr Goh Bee Tin of the National Dental Centre has used Prof Teoh's biodegradable plastic scaffolds to repair the jaws of about 20 patients.

Currently, patients have their own bone grafted from a hip or leg, but this means extra surgery and pain, Dr Goh said.

Other work in bone tissue engineering revolves around improving the biodegradable scaffolds.

National University of Singapore doctoral student Wang Zuyong and colleagues from other universities and hospitals here found that stretching a thin plastic film created tiny grooves that aligns stem cells as they develop, helping nerves and vessels to grow true.

The plastic film is made of the same polycaprolactone material as the fine-meshed scaffold sheets or pieces, and will also degrade as tissue grows.

At the same time, Prof Teoh and his colleagues developed a bioreactor that spins on two axes, rather than the conventional reactors that spin on one axis like a roast on a spit. They found that bone grown using the bioreactor that spins on two axes is stronger and has fewer dead cells, as such bioreactors mimic the mechanical forces present in the body.

Now, the two-axis bioreactor technology has been licensed to home-grown start-up QuinXell Technologies.

Still, others work at the level of cells. Professor Charles James Kirkpatrick of the Johannes Gutenberg University in Germany, who presented at the congress, studies how bone cells "talk" to their surrounding environment when they are implanted, to encourage blood vessels to grow in and through the bone to feed it with nutrients and oxygen.

And at the Agency for Science, Technology and Research's Institute of Medical Biology, Dr Simon Cool and Dr Victor Nurcombe study how sugars called heparan sulfates control cell growth.

Heparan sulfate-treated scaffolds could be used instead of putting large doses of growth factors straight into patients' bodies, which some studies have shown to carry the risk of tumours.

While simply implanting or transplanting bone is relatively straightforward, the challenge facing researchers is to remodel bone and get blood vessels and nerves to regrow accurately, Prof Teoh said.

Fukushima struggles to recover

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

Post-tsunami reconstruction and radiation clean-up could take 10 years, but officials say something has been permanently lost.

Nearly three years after a major earthquake, tsunami and nuclear radiation leak devastated coastal and inland areas of Japan's Fukushima prefecture, 281km north-east of Tokyo, Namie has become a silent town of ghosts and absent lives.

Namie's 21,000 residents remain evacuated because of continuing high radiation levels, the product of the March 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, 9.6km to the south. Homes, shops and streets are deserted except for the occasional police patrol or checkpoint.

Like the setting for a Hollywood post-apocalypse movie, grass and weeds poke up through cracked pavements. At an abandoned garage, a rusting car sits on a raised ramp, waiting for a repair that will never be completed. A feral dog peers from a wild, untended garden.

Namie is nobody's town now. Nobody lives here, and nobody visits for long. Even the looters have stopped bothering, and no one knows exactly when the inhabitants may be allowed to return permanently – or whether they will want to.

The 2011 catastrophe faded from world headlines long ago, but in Namie, Tomioka, Okuma, Futaba and other blighted towns in the 32km evacuation zone around the Fukushima plant, it is a disaster that never ends.

At the plant itself, recent leaks of contaminated water into the sea and a fraught operation to remove fuel rods from one of the damaged reactors have shown how critical the situation still is – and will remain during a decommissioning process that could take up to 40 years.

For Fukushima's displaced population, the effects of the disaster continue to be deeply felt. The evacuation area was subdivided earlier this year into three zones of higher or lower radiation risk. In the worst affected zone, return will not be allowed before 2017 at the earliest.

In other areas, families and businesses face difficult decisions about whether or not to go back. At present, no one is even allowed to stay overnight. Locals say that whatever happens, many younger people will not return.

There is little or no trust in official pronouncements, given the failure of the Fukushima Daiichi operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), to take adequate measures to protect the plant against the tsunami and the company's unimpressive post-disaster record.

There are suspicions that the government knows some towns may never be safe to live in again, but refuses to admit it in order to protect Japan's unpopular nuclear power industry. There is also a sense that Fukushima's victims have been forgotten.

That said, the painstaking cleanup continues and there has been some progress in adjoining, less badly affected areas, according to Hiroshi Murata, the head of the Odaka ward of Minamisoma City, close to Namie.

As many as 18,000 people died or were declared missing in Fukushima prefecture after the tsunami struck. The radiation plumes caused the forced evacuation of a further 154,000, according to the Japan Reconstruction Agency.

In Odaka, 148 people died, and there were more than 300 fatalities in Minamisoma as a whole. But now around 53% of Odaka residents have returned home, a total of 6,800 out of a pre-disaster population of 12,800, Murata said.

Nobody has died directly as a result of the nuclear disaster, but a close eye is being kept on the incidence of thyroid cancer in children, following the experience of Chernobyl.

The biggest issues the local administration now faces, following the rehousing of residents in temporary accommodation, are the demolition of unsafe houses, replacement of infrastructure and services, including roads and school playgrounds, and the decontamination and desalination of buildings and land.

"To decontaminate one house and garden takes 10 to 14 days," Murata said. "We have to remove surface soil, cut the trees, wash the roofs, clean the rain gutters. The house owners are responsible for cleaning inside. The city and the government help with the rest."

At least in Odaka there is something to clean and repair. In Ukedo, the part of Namie municipality closest to the Pacific ocean, the devastation is total. Hardly a single house was left standing by the tsunami, which reached 17m in height in some places, Murata said – a vast wall of water that devoured all in its path.

Wrecked fishing boats still lie stranded miles inland and there are vast piles of scrap metal, smashed cars, bits of concrete bridges and broken wooden house frames where once a thriving village stood. An abandoned elementary school, 500m from the sea, looks as though it has been bombed.

But even in Ukedo, a long line of displaced local resident volunteers can be seen picking up and sorting debris on a wintry afternoon, gradually clearing the land where homes formerly stood. With impressive organisation, the local authorities are recycling everything they can, bagging it up in vast compounds erected amid the bleak, salty flatlands that were once rice paddy fields.

Tetsurou Eguchi, the deputy mayor of Minamisoma City, said the radiation-related cleanup was likely to take another five to six years and could cost as much as ¥350bil, much of which would come from the national government. Post-tsunami reconstruction would take up to 10 years. But something intangible had been permanently lost, he said.

"When it comes to the economy, and individual and social life, it is very difficult to recover this, compared with how it used to be."

The most challenging problem, he said, was decontamination. "Basically (the radioactive fallout) is not in the air any more. It's in the soil."

The area was dependent economically on small businesses, agriculture, fishing and tourism, including the famous annual Soma Nomaoi samurai festival, he said. All had been seriously affected.

"People don't believe it is safe to visit here. They won't believe our produce, our livestock, our fish are safe. There is a blight. This will take a long time to change."

Much had been said by the national government about supporting Fukushima prefecture in its efforts to get back on its feet, but the reality is different, Eguchi said.

"It is a fact that we have received quite a lot of support, but is it sufficient? That is difficult, because it's not just a question of reconstruction. Politicians in Tokyo say if Fukushima does not recover, Japan will not recover, but I'm not sure they really mean that.

"I don't think Fukushima is fully supported by the whole country. And that's what the citizens here think." — Guardian News & Media 2014

Food scandals and political fights: Taiwan's year of the fake

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

Based on Facebook selfies, food safety issues and political battles within and between the political parties, people chose a perfect word to describe Taiwan in 2013: fake. It was a confusing year for the people of Taiwan.

We cannot trust the labels on packages of food, and we cannot trust politicians when they say they are always thinking about the people.

The award-winning documentary Beyond Beauty, released toward the end of 2013, shows the audience the beauty of Taiwan, and also the hidden ugliness of the island. What did people go through and learn from the year of fake?

In 2013, well-known bakery chain store Top Pot Bakery, which claimed to use all-natural ingredients, was exposed for putting artificial flavouring in their bread. Following the scandal, another issue about cooking oil arose. It turned out that many oil manufacturers intentionally mislabelled low-cost cooking oil as olive oil.

People thought that they could trust the labels on products, and believed in major food manufacturers. They were all disappointed after the scandals broke.

Food sellers intentionally mislabelled products so they could lower the cost and earn more profit, and they bet on the fact that most people use the product without questioning it. Most people love beautiful exteriors, and they don't care what the manufacturers does to provide a shining appearance.

The field of politics is always one of the most confusing and complicated of places. In 2013, we witnessed the legislative speaker being accused of involvement in a month-long spectacle involving the Democratic Progressive Party caucus whip, an incident which later transformed into a battle between Wang Jin-pyng and President Ma Ying-jeou.

Taiwan watched these performances by politicians from all parties, and even though the Legislative Yuan cleared Wang of the accusation of illegal lobbying, people were still confused. We are left wondering how the legislators and politicians could focus on fighting for the citizens' benefit when they are so busy fighting each other. And that question was based on the assumption that those battles between politicians were real.

In the documentary Beyond Beauty, audiences were stunned by the beauty of Taiwan that had been overlooked, but they were also shocked by the pollution and destruction that is taking place. Rivers were turned the colour of desperation and trees were replaced by illegally constructed buildings. If the director and camera crew could capture these true images and present them to audiences, how can people with the authority to make a difference pretend like nothing is happening?

The truth is, most people who have political power spend most of their time trying to maintain that power instead of being concerned for the public. They always wait until the media or the public unwrap the ugly truth hidden inside shining packages to start acting.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare started massive inspections and proposed amendments to increase punishments for food sellers who mislabel products after the cooking oil scandal was revealed. Kaohsiung City's Environmental Protection Bureau started to crack down on factories that dumped wastewater into rivers illegally after the public was shocked by the colour of the Hou-chin River.

The Ministry of the Interior began to look into illegally operated hostels at Cingjing Farm after the documentary Beyond Beauty showed the nation the potential hazard those hostels could bring to the area.

Sometimes, a certain level of fake can bring no harm to anyone, just like lengthening a model's legs with Photoshop cannot hurt people who see the image.

However, it does leave people with a false impression and keeps people from seeing the truth. With all the fake information from food labels, "entertaining" performances from politicians, and shocking footage from Beyond Beauty in 2013, people in Taiwan can still have some hope for 2014. If not, at least they have learned how to fake it.

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

The Star Online: World Updates

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U.S. Midwest, Northeast brace for Arctic blast, record lows

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 07:10 PM PST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Many parts of the U.S. Midwest braced for a blast of Arctic air this weekend that could bring some of the coldest temperatures in two decades before advancing to the Northeast, where residents are still digging out from a deadly snowstorm.

Starting Sunday, the deep freeze will be felt in the northern U.S. plains, including North and South Dakota, and through the Great Lakes region and Ohio Valley, according to the National Weather Service.

It will be some of the coldest weather to grip the region in two decades, with blizzard conditions expected in the Central Plains and Great Lakes regions, forecasters said.

"The last really big Arctic outbreak was 1994," said Bob Oravec, a forecaster with the National Weather Service. "Outbreaks like this don't occur every day."

In northeastern Canada, about 110,000 customers were without power due to a transformer fire on Saturday linked to heavy snow, government officials and Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro said.

The push of Arctic air could bring record low temperatures from Montana to Michigan, before moving the Northeast, where it will arrive by early Tuesday, forecasters said.

Temperatures in Chicago could drop to about minus 20 (minus 29 Celsius). Pittsburgh could see temperatures about 11 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (minus 24 Celsius) by early Tuesday.

Temperatures were forecast to fall to 30 below in parts of the north central United States early Sunday morning, and in Grand Forks, North Dakota, wind chills were expected to exceed 50 below. A high of 19 below is forecast for Sunday.

"You grin and bear it and bundle up," said Rachel Osowski, a clerk at Hugo's Supermarket in Grand Forks. "You have to survive and function, you can't let the weather stop you."

In such conditions, frostbite can set in on exposed skin within five minutes, forecasters warned.

CLOSED SCHOOLS

Preparing for the dangerous weather, officials in several states asked residents to use extra precautions when outdoors.

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton has ordered all public schools in the state closed on Monday to protect children from dangerously cold weather.

Chicago schools will be open Monday despite the cold but officials advised parents to "use their own discretion in deciding whether to send their child to school."

In Pittsburgh, the transition team for Mayor-elect Bill Peduto said his inauguration ceremony on Monday would be moved from the steps of the local government building to an indoor venue because of the weather.

Officials in Kentucky, which could see up to 8 inches (20 cm) of snow and freezing temperatures, were warning people to avoid road travel and stay indoors.

"If you don't need to be out, stay in, stay home," said Buddy Rogers, spokesman for Kentucky Emergency Management.

Schools will remain closed in Nashville, Tennessee, until Wednesday, a day after winter break was supposed to end, local officials said.

The storm comes on the heels of a massive weather system that slammed the U.S. Midwest and Northeast just after New Year's Day, causing several deaths, grounding thousands of flights and forcing schools and government offices to close.

MISSED FLIGHTS

At the Best Western motel in Bemidji, Minnesota, some drivers stopped for the night because of the cold, connecting their cars to special heaters to keep the engines from freezing, said motel manager Monica Horn.

A total of 1,266 flights were cancelled across the United States and 6,036 flights delayed on Saturday, with Chicago's O'Hare International Airport and Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey among the most affected, according to tracking firm FlightAware.com.

Molly Cox, in New York City for New Year's Eve, said she missed her Friday night flight home to Denver because LaGuardia Airport was "a disaster."

"With all the cancellations, all of the airlines seem to be having this kind of chaos," she said.

Boston was especially hard-hit by the first major storm of 2014, logging about 18 inches (45 cm) of snow on Friday, while some towns north of New England's largest city were dealing with close to 2 feet (60 cm) of accumulated snow.

But life has begun to return to normal in Boston. The city lifted its snow emergency at 5 p.m. on Friday.

New York City got about 7 inches (18 cm) of snow on Friday and was slammed with overnight air temperatures hovering under the freezing mark. Washington received more than 2 inches (5 cm) of snow in the storm, Philadelphia roughly 5 inches (13 cm) and Hartford, Connecticut 7 inches (18 cm). (U.S. snowfall: link.reuters.com/zym75v)

FOOTBALL AND CHICKEN SOUP

In Green Bay, Wisconsin, the temperature plummeted to minus 18 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 28 C) on Friday, breaking a record for the date set in 1979, according to the National Weather Service.

With the new frigid air moving in, a National Football League wild card playoff game between the Green Bay Packers and the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday at Green Bay's Lambeau Field was expected to rank among the coldest matches on record, local officials said.

Some 40,000 tickets to the game have been sold, according to the Packers.

High-tech equipment, vigilant medical care and perhaps even chicken soup will be on tap to combat the Arctic conditions, Dr. Matthew J. Matava, head team doctor for the St. Louis Rams and president of the National Football League Physicians Society, told Reuters.

"A lot of sidelines will have warm chicken broth available. It tastes good, it's going to be warm and help warm them internally. It contains electrolytes and the sodium chloride (salt) helps replenish electrolytes you lose in sweat," Matava said.

(Additional reporting by Kevin Murphy in Kansas City, David Jones in Newark, New Jersey, Daniel Lovering in Boston, Dave Warner in Philadelphia, Tim Ghianni in Nashville, Karen Pierog in Chicago and Larry Fine in New York; Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis, Nick Zieminski, Gunna Dickson and Dan Grebler)

U.S. breaker to help Russian, Chinese ships stuck in Antarctic ice

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 04:50 PM PST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is sending a heavy icebreaker to help free a Russian ship and a Chinese icebreaker gripped by Antarctic ice, the Coast Guard said on Saturday.

The Polar Star is responding to a request for assistance from Australian authorities as well as from the Russian and Chinese governments, the Coast Guard statement said.

"The U.S. Coast Guard stands ready to respond to Australia's request," Coast Guard Pacific Area Commander Vice Admiral Paul Zukunft said. "Our highest priority is safety of life at sea, which is why we are assisting in breaking a navigational path for both of these vessels."

Coast Guard Chief Warrant Officer Allyson Conroy said the Polar Star was expected to arrive on the scene on January 12 and take two to three days to complete its mission.

"You're looking at the Antarctic, which is a challenge in itself. You have weather and you have ice," Conroy said in a phone interview. "But our crews are very well trained and we expect to be successful in this mission."

A Chinese icebreaker that helped rescue 52 passengers from a Russian ship stranded in Antarctic ice found itself stuck in heavy ice on Friday.

A helicopter from the Snow Dragon ferried the passengers from the stranded Russian ship to an Australian icebreaker late on Thursday. The Chinese vessel now had concerns about its own ability to move through heavy ice, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said.

The Russian-owned research ship, Akademik Shokalskiy, left New Zealand on November 28 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of an Antarctic journey led by Australian explorer Douglas Mawson.

It became trapped on December 24, 100 nautical miles east of French Antarctic station Dumont d'Urville and about 1,500 nautical miles south of Tasmania.

During their time on the ice, passengers amused themselves with movies, classes in knot tying, languages, yoga and photography, and rang in the New Year with dinner, drinks and a song their adventure.

The Coast Guard's Polar Star is 399 feet (120 meters) long with a maximum speed of 18 knots. It can continuously break 6 feet (1.8 meters) of ice at three knots, and can break 21 feet (6.4 meters) of ice backing and ramming, the Coast Guard said.

The Polar Star has cut short its planned stop in Sydney to conduct the mission. It left its home port of Seattle in early December on "Operation Deep Freeze," to break a channel through the sea ice of McMurdo Sound in Antarctica to resupply and refuel the U.S. Antarctic Program's McMurdo Station on Ross Island.

Kerry sees progress on Israeli-Palestinian framework deal

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 02:40 PM PST

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Israel and the Palestinians are making progress towards a "framework agreement" to guide their talks on a formal peace deal but still have some way to go, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Saturday.

Speaking after extensive, separate talks with Palestinian and Israeli leaders, Kerry sounded somewhat hopeful about the chances of ending the conflict, despite misgivings voiced recently by both sides and a lack of tangible signs of movement.

On his 10th visit to the region in a year, Kerry is trying to establish what U.S. officials call a "framework" of general guidelines for an accord, with details to be filled in later.

"I am confident that the talks we have had in the last two days have already fleshed out and even resolved certain kinds of issues and presented new opportunities for others," he said after meeting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

"We are not there yet, but we are making progress," Kerry told reporters in Ramallah, seat of Abbas' government.

Since arriving in the region on Thursday, Kerry has spent about eight hours in talks with Abbas and, after a roughly four-hour and 40-minute session in Jerusalem on Saturday night, more than 12 hours with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

U.S.-brokered Israeli-Palestinian peace talks resumed last July after a three-year halt, with Kerry leading the push despite widespread scepticism about a successful outcome.

Kerry said he would fly to Jordan and Saudi Arabia on Sunday to discuss with their rulers the peace talks, which the United States hopes will lead to an agreement within nine months.

CORE ISSUES

Broad Arab support is viewed as crucial if the Palestinians are to make the compromises likely to prove necessary to strike a peace deal with Israel. Kerry also said he plans to meet a group of Arab foreign ministers next weekend.

On arrival in Jerusalem on Thursday, Kerry said the framework he was trying to build would aim to address all of the conflict's core issues, including borders, security, the future of Palestinian refugees and the fate of Jerusalem.

Both sides have expressed doubts about his efforts.

On Saturday Israel's Strategic Affairs Minister Yuval Steinitz, a Netanyahu confidant, questioned Abbas's intentions.

"We have great doubt about Abu Mazen's (Abbas) willingness to reach an agreement," he told a town hall meeting. "We see the strong incitement and anti-Semitism of the Palestinian Authority led by (Abbas) as a main obstacle on the road to an agreement."

Palestinian protesters in Ramallah on Friday condemned the U.S. Secretary of State's efforts, chanting "Kerry, you coward, there's no place for you in Palestine!"

One woman angrily wagged her finger at Kerry's motorcade as it swept through the city on Saturday afternoon.

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat urged Israel to stop building Jewish settlements on occupied land the Palestinians want for a state and to halt house demolitions, which rights groups view as a form of collective punishment.

But Erekat, standing beside Kerry in Ramallah, also made a case for peace directly to the Palestinians and he suggested that Kerry could return to the region later this month.

"No one benefits more from the success of Secretary Kerry's efforts than Palestinians and no one stands to lose more (from) failure than Palestinians," he said.

(Additional reporting by Ori Lewis in Jerusalem and Nidal Al-Mughrabi in Gaza; Editing by Gareth Jones and Rosalind Russell)

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

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Boeing machinists approve contract securing 777X jet

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 04:13 AM PST

SEATTLE/NEW YORK: Boeing's machinists on Friday narrowly approved a crucial labor contract that secured thousands of jobs and billions of dollars of economic activity for Washington state but will cost workers their pensions.

The vote of 51 percent to 49 percent to accept the deal means Boeing Co will build its new 777X jetliner and wings in the Seattle area, where Boeing has built aircraft for more than 90 years.

Had the workers rejected the offer, Boeing would have considered making the successor to its popular 777 widebody jet elsewhere, and had received offers from 22 states interested in hosting the new factory.

"This decision means Boeing hopefully will stop pursuit of another site for its 777X program," said a somber Jim Bearden, administrative assistant to machinist District 751 President Tom Wroblewski.

"They held a gun to our head and our people were afraid," said Lester Mullen, a District 751 council delegate who works on the current 777 wing production line.

Boeing's reaction was in stark contrast to the mood in the Seattle union hall where the results were announced.

"The future of Boeing in the Puget Sound region has never looked brighter," Boeing Commercial Airplanes Chief Executive Ray Conner said in a statement. "This will put our workforce on the cutting edge of composite technology, while sustaining thousands of local jobs for years to come."

NO STRIKE BEFORE 2024

In clinching the agreement, Boeing secured the location favored by analysts and investors, who saw far lower risk in using the factory and workers who now build the 777.

Boeing also ensured that the machinists won't have an opportunity to strike until 2024, when the new contract expires.

The decision drew praise from political leaders who had brought pressure to bear on the union to approve the deal.

"I'm very pleased that the best place in the world to build jet airliners for decades will continue for decades to come," said Governor Jay Inslee in a brief media conference in the state capital Olympia. "This has been a long road, and I respect everyone who has worked on it, but now's the time to come together, go build this airplane. I'm happy about that."

Addressing a concern raised by union members, Inslee said there were safeguards in recently passed state legislation giving $8.7 billion in incentives to Boeing and the industry to ensure the plane maker keeps 777X jobs in Washington state and doesn't open a second line in another state, as it did in South Carolina with the 787 Dreamliner.

After winning the incentives and the contract vote, "it is time for Boeing to hold up its end of the bargain," said Rep. Rick Larsen, whose congressional district includes the 777 factory. "Washington has shown that we stand behind a strong aerospace industry. Boeing should make the same commitment to our state."

Workers had argued that with Boeing earning healthy profits, and its share price at a record high, it should not be demanding that its workers give up past contract gains.

The choice Boeing offered had opened deep rifts between the local International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM), which opposed the contract, and its Washington, D.C.-based leadership, which forced a vote on the proposal.

It had also revealed cleavages between younger workers open to the deal and older workers dead set against it. Some 49 percent of the machinists are 50 or older, the union said.

In November, two-thirds of machinists voted against Boeing's first offer, which would have replaced their traditional defined-benefit pension with a defined-contribution savings plan, one of two retirement plans the workers receive.

The union's national leadership negotiated that deal. But local leaders opposed it, saying the take-aways were too great.

In the vote on Friday, members approved an eight-year contract extension that the union said provided $1 billion in additional benefits beyond the prior offer, but that will halt pension contributions in 2016.

SHARP DIVISION

About 600 votes separated yes from no, union officials said. Some members wanted a recount, but the national leaders would not allow it, said Wilson Ferguson, vice president of District 751.

Ferguson said about 8,000 members did not vote, up from 5,000 in the prior ballot in November. The union has about 31,000 eligible members.

Before the vote, a member filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board taking issue with the timing, just after Boeing's traditional closure between Christmas and the New Year, when many workers were away, the union said. The union allowed online absentee voting.

The divide between the local leaders and their national counterparts is mirrored by divisions over the contract that appear to cleave along age lines.

Younger machinists had voiced strong concern that failing to vote for the contract would cost them their jobs as Boeing moves the work elsewhere. The 777X is the last major development on Boeing's books for the next 15 years. If the plane was built elsewhere, it would have slowly eroded aerospace jobs in Washington. The average wage is $29 an hour.

Many older workers, however, had said the pension was sacred and was worth risking job loss.

"There's plenty of aviation work in the world," said Kevin Flynn, an aviation maintenance technician inspector, who has filed a separate complaint against the national union leaders with the National Labor Relations Board for holding the vote against the wishes of a majority of members.

"I'll just have to move to where the work is."

Tom Captain, head of the global aerospace and defense practice at Deloitte, said the difficult decision the union faced reflected the fact that aerospace work can be moved to new locations and that price competition between Boeing and rival plane maker Airbus is fierce.

"Although painful tense and emotional, it is clear that there is a sober recognition of the new reality in commercial aerospace manufacturing," he said. - Reuters

China pledges further support for solar industry

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 04:00 AM PST

SHANGHAI: China pledged further support support for its ailing solar power industry on Saturday as the government seeks to revive a sector struggling with overcapacity and falling prices.

The State Council, China's cabinet, said in July that the country aimed to more than quadruple solar power generating capacity to 35 gigawatts by 2015 in an apparent bid to ease a glut in the domestic solar power industry.

The State Council, in a statement published on its website, said the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology was taking measures to "promote the healthy development of the photovoltaic industry".

The ministry, it said, was implementing the July directive by supporting consolidation in the industry, drafting guidelines for mergers and acquisitions and promoting standardisation.

It said the ministry was encouraging technological innovation, especially related to decentralised solar power installations not connected to the power grid. It was also supporting research and development efforts for batteries that can store solar electricity.

The ministry sought to improve standardisation and ensure "orderly competition" in the industry, the statement said.

The State Council said the solar industry had enjoyed a recovery in 2013. Total installed solar power generating capacity increased by around 8 GW, of which 6 GW were in power plants and 2 GW were in decentralised instillations, the statement said, citing preliminary estimates from the China Photovoltaic Industry Alliance.

Still, Chinese solar equipment producers LDK Solar Co Ltd and JA Solar Holdings Co Ltd are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.

China's support for its solar industry has been a source of trade friction. The United States and European Union have accused China of dumping underpriced solar panels on foreign markets and China has responded with anti-subsidy duties of its own. - Reuters

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

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Health Ministry to stub out illegal cigs

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

PETALING JAYA: The Health Ministry will be carrying out a series of integrated enforcement activities to clamp down on the sale or purchase of illicit cigarettes.

The ministry's disease control division director Dr Chong Chee Kheong said to circumvent the shortage of manpower in enforcing the amendment to the Control of Tobacco Product Regulations 2004, they would work together with agencies such as the Customs Department, Domestic Trade, Co­ope­ratives and Consumerism Ministry and the Malaysian Mari­time En­­forcement Agency.

"The enforcement activities will be conducted thoroughly at the state and district level with the collaboration of these inter-agencies," said Dr Chong in an e-mail interview.

Effective Jan 1, Regulation 15(4A) states that no person shall sell or offer for sale, buy or has in his possession any packet or carton of cigarette that is not printed with the text required and health warning images as specified in this regulation.

"Regulation 15 is the requirement for the labelling and packaging for the packet or carton of cigarettes. Any packets or cartons of cigarettes which do not comply with this requirement are considered as illegal or contraband cigarettes," he said.

To date, the Health Ministry has conducted a briefing session with all personnel from the non-communicable disease section, inspectorate and legal officers to ensure that everyone is familiar with this requirement, he said.

He added that integrated and routine enforcement activities were part of the National Strategic Action Plan on Tobacco Control, which was developed by the ministry and would be carried out between 2014 to 2018.

Dr Chong said the police and local authorities would also assist in activities targeting illegal or contraband cigarettes, cigarettes sold below the retail selling price, and cigarettes without the pictorial health warning.

Police probe negligence angle in toddler’s death

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

KUANTAN: Police will probe if there was negligence in the death of a three-year-old boy who was left in a car by his father for over nine hours.

State CID chief Senior Asst Comm Datuk Mohd Zakaria Ahmad said the case would be investigated under Section 31(1)(a) of the Child Act for negligence.

"We will call up the parents and other witnesses for questioning. It will then be up to the Deputy Public Prosecutor to decide on ­whether to file charges," he said when contacted yesterday.

On Thursday, the boy was found dead in his parents' car, where he was left forgotten ­during the hectic first day of school.

Kuantan OCPD Asst Comm Mohd Jasmani Yusoff said the 41-year-old father had taken his wife and six children to SMK Pandan at 7.30am.

After dropping off his wife and three of his children there, the father proceeded to SK Tunku Azizah in Indera Mahkota to drop off his other children at school. The toddler was also in the car at the time.

"At 10am, his wife called him, asking him to pick her up at SMK Pandan but he did not do that. He drove to Taman Tas for a drink instead. He only went to SK Tunku Azizah at 2pm and found his wife already there," said ACP Mohd Jasmani.

The father, who is a labourer, waited at the guardhouse while his wife registered their children for religious classes.

"It was only at 5pm that he returned to his car and was shocked to find his son's lifeless body," said ACP Mohd Jasmani, adding that the boy was rushed to the Tengku Ampuan Afzan Hospital but there was nothing anyone could do by then.

ACP Mohd Jasmani said the father admitted that he forgot his son was in the car and only realised it at 5pm. He also said the post-mortem could not determine the cause of death and the boy's organs would be sent to the Chemistry Depart­ment for analysis.

Lim not ‘walking his talk’, says Hilmi

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

GEORGE TOWN: Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng continues to come under fire for the purchase of a Mercedes-Benz S300L as his official car.

Describing Lim as cakap tak serupa bikin (not walking his talk), Deputy Health Minister Datuk Seri Dr Hilmi Yahaya said he had previously been vocal in lambasting the Terengganu state government for the same purchase.

"But now, he is preaching what he has criticised others (of doing)," said the Balik Pulau MP after presenting RM4,000 in incentive each to 19 padi farmers from the Seri Pulau Area Farmers Organisation here yesterday.

He was commenting on Lim's criticism in 2008 of the Terengganu government's purchase of a fleet of Mercedes-Benz as official cars then.

Dr Hilmi said "it was wrong in principle" for Lim to buy a Mercedes-Benz when he had criticised the Terengganu government of doing so.

"Penang is a small place and it's a short distance to everywhere. So, the Toyota Camry is enough," he said in reference to the Toyota Camry 2.5 which Lim had only used for about two months.

The car was among 15 Camrys delivered to the state government on Oct 31 at a cost of RM113,500 each after tax exemption.

State Financial Officer Datuk Mokhtar Jait had said on Tuesday that the car would now be used by Deputy Speaker Maktar Shapee.

Yesterday, Mokhtar denied allegations that the RM100,000 discount given for the Mercedes-Benz S300L was from a businessman, describing such claims as slanderous.

He, however, did not mention who had made the allegations.

In a statement, Mokhtar said the discount – given to everyone who wished to buy the Mercedes-Benz S300L 2012 model – was offered by Mercedes-Benz suppliers throughout the country and not by a "dealer".

Lim, he said, was actually entitled to use two Mercedes-Benz models – S400 and S300 – but chose the S300L which was bought for RM298,263.75 after tax exemption and the discount.

"The car was bought because of the tax exemption as well as the discount," he said.

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf

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The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf


A book light years ahead

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

BARING some extraordinary December surprise, this is the best professional and personal development book of 2013 – by light years.

It took me into hyperspace and back, and the best parts of the book had me literally cheering out loud, which did not much please the fitfully slumbering gentleman sitting next to me on a night-flight to Jakarta.

It's a tome of wisdom for working earthlings presented as a memoir, and it works magnificently on both levels.

If you're a YouTube junkie or space-news follower, you may have heard of Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield. And if you're a North American, you certainly will have.
 
He's the moustachioed dude whose video of his acoustic cover-version of David Bowie's Space Oddity, literally recorded in outer space, went viral in May 2013, receiving over 10 million hits in its first three days online. It was something of a gimmick – and a pretty rope rendition – but a well-conceived idea. It's fair to say too that he writes better than he plays the guitar.

The sub-title of this book is: What Going to Space Taught Me About Ingenuity, Determination, And Being Prepared for Anything. And Hadfield makes it clear that he wants to impart these lessons to others.

Therefore, this is a very different kind of memoir. Rather than simply recounting his life-story in a linear manner, the recently retired skywalker discusses what he's learned from each stage of his life and how he's applied these lessons over the years to consolidate on success.

If you bought this book because you're a NASA enthusiast, you'll be somewhat disappointed. This is not space-nerd reading material. It's another kind of work altogether, with life lessons employed as a framework for its three satisfying sections: "Pre-launch", "Liftoff", and "Coming Down To Earth".

Even before he attained YouTube celebrity status, which came with his social media-friendly commandership of the International Space Station, Hadfield was already a national hero in his native Canada. He's even had an airport named after him (the one that serves his smallish hometown in Ontario Province).

Life, of course, hasn't always been easy for the multi-talented and personable Hadfield. And he describes the trials and tribulations of his space years – particularly the strained family life of an astronaut – with candour. But before we get there, we're treated to the inevitable inspirational TV-viewing of the 1969 moon landing, as seen by the awestruck boy Hadfield.

We read tales of his happy childhood with his large, loving, farm family, the challenging test-pilot years, and marriage and parenthood. And then the book really takes off – with his account of moving with determination through the ranks, and what he learnt from this process. Then the missions themselves, and pearls of wisdom connecting life in space with more mundane terrestrial living – the important points are the same in both places.

The single thing Hadfield can't stand is negativity, and he has much to say on the subject. True to his word, he doesn't have a harsh word for anyone he's worked with, and that would have included many uber-competitive and ruthless alpha males. Nice guys sometimes do win in the end.

Hadfield's evangelizing on positive thinking is convincing because one sees cause and effect throughout An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth. Hadfield smiles at fate; fate smiles back rewardingly.

He also never forgot his manners. He explains how, from an early age, he sought out and thanked anyone that would part with information or knowledge to help him achieve his goal of becoming an astronaut.

Another lesson he imparts – again by example rather than telling – is the importance of getting one's hands dirty with jobs and tasks others might see as demeaning, but are important in securing the end goal.

Cynics and the world-weary will find his earnest tone painfully pious at times. But even the most jaded old sod – me – has to concede he makes an excellent case for his zero-tolerance of negativity.

There's nothing new under the sun when it comes to professional-development books, and duly the topics Hadfield engages in, tick all the usual boxes: the importance of goal-setting goals, training, of paying attention to the smallest details, of staying humble and ready to learn more, and of the importance of never being a drag on your team, crew, or organisation. Most are thrillingly illuminated through Hadfield's own out-of-this-world experiences.

At the core of An Astronaut's Guide To Life On Earth are the author's accounts of his three missions, which make for compulsive reading. And the universal truths that twinkle through these narratives like a constellation, give this book star quality.

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

The Star Online: Metro: Central

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Indonesian volcano erupts 30 times as 20,000 displaced

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 01:54 AM PST

KARO, Indonesia, Jan 04, 2014 (AFP) - An Indonesian volcano that has erupted relentlessly for months shot volcanic ash into the air 30 times on Saturday, forcing further evacuations with more than 20,000 people now displaced, an official said.

Mount Sinabung on the western island of Sumatra sent rivers of lava flowing through an evacuation zone and columns of volcanic cloud up as high as 4,000 metres (13,000 feet), National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.

"Hot lava spewed from the volcano some 60 times, reaching up to five kilometres (three miles) southeast of the crater. This outpour is the biggest we've seen in all the recent eruptions," Nugroho said.

Authorities had already told residents in a five-kilometre radius of the volcano to evacuate, and Nugroho said an expanded evacuation zone may be considered.

The number of people who have now fled the rumbling volcano since it began erupting in September last year has risen to 20,331, Nugroho said.

Mount Sinabung is one of dozens of active volcanoes in Indonesia that straddle major tectonic fault lines, known as the Ring of Fire.

It had been quiet for around 400 years until it rumbled back to life in 2010, and again in September last year.

In August, five people were killed and hundreds evacuated when a volcano on a tiny island in East Nusa Tenggara province erupted.

The country's most active volcano, Mount Merapi in central Java, killed more than 350 people in a series of violent eruptions in 2010.

Kin identify bodies found in river

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

The bodies of two men found separately along two rivers here, were identified by their family members.

Lee Eng Hock, 59, whose body was found in the Singapore River at about 4pm on Thursday, was jobless and suffered from depression, his younger brother Lee Eng Hwa, 57, said at the mortuary at Singapore General Hospital.

The man whose body was found in Kallang River on the same day, has been identified by his uncle.

The uncle, who declined to be named, said his nephew was the middle child and has two other siblings.

The deceased lived alone and had a sales jobs in Arab Street before he died. He would have turned 30 this year. His father is currently in India and his mother died about three years ago, said the uncle.

Police have classified both cases as unnatural death and are investigating. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

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The Star Online: Metro: South & East

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Indonesian volcano erupts 30 times as 20,000 displaced

Posted: 04 Jan 2014 01:54 AM PST

KARO, Indonesia, Jan 04, 2014 (AFP) - An Indonesian volcano that has erupted relentlessly for months shot volcanic ash into the air 30 times on Saturday, forcing further evacuations with more than 20,000 people now displaced, an official said.

Mount Sinabung on the western island of Sumatra sent rivers of lava flowing through an evacuation zone and columns of volcanic cloud up as high as 4,000 metres (13,000 feet), National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said.

"Hot lava spewed from the volcano some 60 times, reaching up to five kilometres (three miles) southeast of the crater. This outpour is the biggest we've seen in all the recent eruptions," Nugroho said.

Authorities had already told residents in a five-kilometre radius of the volcano to evacuate, and Nugroho said an expanded evacuation zone may be considered.

The number of people who have now fled the rumbling volcano since it began erupting in September last year has risen to 20,331, Nugroho said.

Mount Sinabung is one of dozens of active volcanoes in Indonesia that straddle major tectonic fault lines, known as the Ring of Fire.

It had been quiet for around 400 years until it rumbled back to life in 2010, and again in September last year.

In August, five people were killed and hundreds evacuated when a volcano on a tiny island in East Nusa Tenggara province erupted.

The country's most active volcano, Mount Merapi in central Java, killed more than 350 people in a series of violent eruptions in 2010.

Kin identify bodies found in river

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

The bodies of two men found separately along two rivers here, were identified by their family members.

Lee Eng Hock, 59, whose body was found in the Singapore River at about 4pm on Thursday, was jobless and suffered from depression, his younger brother Lee Eng Hwa, 57, said at the mortuary at Singapore General Hospital.

The man whose body was found in Kallang River on the same day, has been identified by his uncle.

The uncle, who declined to be named, said his nephew was the middle child and has two other siblings.

The deceased lived alone and had a sales jobs in Arab Street before he died. He would have turned 30 this year. His father is currently in India and his mother died about three years ago, said the uncle.

Police have classified both cases as unnatural death and are investigating. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

Costly affair to spy on husband

Posted: 03 Jan 2014 08:00 AM PST

A dentist who spent S$55,000 (RM142,700) on private investigators to spy on her cheating husband will get only S$10,000 (RM26,000) to settle the bill after a judge described the amount she paid as "unusually large".

The 35-year-old had wanted evidence to support a divorce from her 42-year-old husband of nine years. She suspected him of having affairs with two women.

Investigators caught the chief investment officer "behaving intimately" with one of them, and the couple divorced a year ago.

A settlement case was held to determine how their assets would be split, but in judgment grounds released yesterday, Judicial Commissioner George Wei shared the husband's scepticism over the investigators' bills.

The total 213 hours of surveillance cost S$41,400 (RM107,400) – or about S$195 (RM506) per hour.

The husband, defended by lawyers Andy Chiok and Loy Wee Sun, produced a source which charged about S$400 (RM1,038) per day or S$6,000 (RM15,500) for an unlimited package until evidence is found.

The wife, represented by lawyer Foo Siew Fong, spent another S$13,600 (RM35,300) on "data forensic extraction" from the husband's cellphone and laptop, according to the bills. These produced no results for the court.

The judge held that while it may not be fair to make comparisons, the sum of S$41,400 (RM107,400) was "outstandingly unreasonable".

Divorce lawyers said that such fees do not usually exceed S$10,000 (RM26,000) .

"Given that the wife relied on the husband's improper association with two other women as the grounds for divorce, in hindsight, there was sufficient evidence on Sept 10 (the first of the three days) to support her petition," said the judge.

The judge ordered that the couple's S$5.5mil (RM14mil) three-storey penthouse be sold, and 75% be apportioned to the husband and 25% to the wife.

He based his decision on the respective financial contributions of the parties and the relatively short length of the marriage. — The Straits Times / Asia News Network

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The Star eCentral: TV Tracks

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The Star eCentral: TV Tracks


Getting wires crossed

Posted: 24 Dec 2013 03:52 PM PST

There is some artificial fun to be had in Almost Human, a buddy-cop TV series set in the future.

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

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